In Chile

I am now in Chile, writing to you from a internet cafe across the street from the hostal I'm staying at in Santiago. I arrived Friday, but not without some adventure (traveling in South America is never routine). I left Trinidad on Thursday night (3rd), but my plane was delayed for two hours so instead of leaving at the scheduled 7:30pm time, we left at 9:30 due to some mechanical problems. Planning to leave around the dinner hour, I rushed out to have some chicken at a popular spot that I usually go to. During the flight though, my stomach started feeling so-so and once I arrived in La Paz and got to my hotel room, I really had a bad stomachache. Let's just say that night was spent more in the bathroom than in my bed. The next day, I felt ok, so I ate some bread (traditional breakfast) and then went to the airport. Once I got to the airport, I started feeling really lousy. In hindsight, I think I was dehydrated from undisclosed events that took place in the bathroom the previous night which deteriorated into altitude sickness (the La Paz airport is the highest in the world at nearly 15,000 feet in elevation). The lowpoint that morning was throwing up on the jetway boarding the plane (a first for me!). I felt lousy the whole flight, which fortunately was 45 min to Iquique. Thankfully Iquique is at sea level, so immediately I started feeling better. And finally, two days later, here in Santiago, my stomach is almost back to normal.

So anyway, on to the things I've seen. I'm here with Wayne and Audrey, two of my friends from college. Yesterday we traveled to the beautiful coastal cities of Valparaiso and Viña del Mar. Valparaiso has to be one of the coolest cities I've ever been to, they have these funiculars all over the city (vertical trolley cars). What a neat invention! We rode on the oldest one in the city, dating back to 1883. In addition to this there were narrow streets with brightly colored buildings with occasional lookouts into the bay. Supposedly it's a lot like San Francisco, but on a smaller scale, but having never been to SF, I wouldn't know. Viña del Mar which literally borders the city limits of Valpo is the more upscale beach area that a lot of Chileans have condos and go to vacation. However, the water is very cold, so no swimming takes place in the ocean. After returning to Santiago, we went up Cerro San Cristobal via funicular which has a beautiful overlook of the city.

Today, we went into the mountains, visiting the Cajon del Maipo (Maipo Canyon) just east of Santiago. It was absolutely stunning, we first went to a town called San Jose de Maipo and then later to a private ecological reserve where they had guided tours to this waterfall that had an impressive view of the mountains. The waterfall itself was pretty neat too, but I can't build it up too much since it really will pale in comparison to the mighty Iguazu Falls I'm going to in a few days. But now, I'm back in Santiago, really tired and tomorrow morning we leave for Buenos Aires. We'll be back in Santiago at the end of our trip, and during that time we'll actually explore Santiago proper since we will only have a half day.

That's all for now, more to come later . . .